About A1 Animals

A1 Animals has been providing trained animals for the entertainment industry for over thirty years. During that time we have built up a wealth of experience in achieving the best performance from our animals, whether in stills, films, television or in front of a live audience.

Liz Thornton, the proprietor, has a varied background covering the training of most domestic and farm animals and is also our acknowledged feline expert, we offer a large number of trained cats to meet any situation, some are "action" cats while others are more suited to sedentary jobs! Sue McCabe, the head trainer has come to the film industry via Guide Dogs and various canine sports, both as a competitor and judge. We have a core of dogs trained to a very high standard and also connections with breeders and Show Dogs.

British Timber Dog working for Twilight film idents

All our training is done exclusively with positive motivation, we use food or toys to reward our animals as appropriate, and never employ negative methods. If your requirements are a little unusual we can offer advice on specially tailored training regimes in order to achieve the desired outcome! If it's possible we'll do it! No agency can hold every breed of animal, but we have many contacts in all areas of animals be it domestic, farm or wildlife and we do like a challenge, so please contact us for a chat about your animal requirements.

The Pets Passport Scheme means that we can now travel many of our dogs abroad, and we have worked extensively on the continent, particularly in Spain and Germany, and also in the United States. For any information about which dogs are "passported", please email or give us a ring.

We hope that you find our website informative, but if you can't find exactly what you are looking for, please contact us as our animal network is constantly expanding, and we pride ourselves on sourcing even the rarest of breeds when required.

Although we have many years of practical experience, we also keep up to date with modern thinking, and to this end, Liz and Sue have both achieved Level 4 NVQ (Animal Handlers on Audio Visual Production Sets)